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The Deer I Almost Met
The deer on Itsukushima don’t bow. I found that out on my first day in Japan, standing near the torii gate as three of them walked past me like I wasn’t there. One glanced my way, decided I wasn’t interesting, and kept going. No crackers. No performance. Just deer, moving through. You see them all over the island. Near the shops, on the paths, by the temples. The younger ones come closer, a few meters away, but never close enough to touch. They watch, gauge, decide. There’s something earned about that distance. Later, walking near Nara Park, I saw something I wasn’t expecting. A poster showing a white deer with…
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The Gate Between Worlds: Japan’s Torii
Standing before the floating torii at Itsukushima in January 2025, I watched the vermilion gate rise from the tide like a threshold between what we know and what we don’t. No other structure in Japan marks the sacred so simply — two posts, a lintel, a tie-beam. Yet this unadorned frame carries weight that temples and castles cannot. Torii have stood at shrine entrances since at least 922 AD, though their roots may stretch further. The oldest surviving stone torii dates to the 12th century at a Hachiman shrine in Yamagata Prefecture; the oldest wooden example is from 1535 at Kubō Hachiman Shrine in Yamanashi. Scholars believe their origins trace…
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Japan’s Hidden Spirit World: How Yōkai Became Part of Everyday Life
The first time I really noticed yokai, I was in Japan standing in front of a row of fox statues. I’d seen them before — those stone foxes you find at shrines, usually in pairs, mouths open or closed depending on what you’re supposed to believe. On this particular visit I actually stopped and looked at them properly. They were everywhere. Not just at one shrine — at Inari shrines, at random intersections, at places that looked like they’d been there forever. And the thing that caught me was how casual everyone was being about it. People walked past, touched them, threw coins at them, prayed to them. Nobody was…
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Two Cows, Two Stories: What a Decade-Old Souvenir Taught Me About Japan
The white ox—blessed at Dazaifu Tenmangu shrine I was digging through a box of old travel mementos the other day when I found them again—two small cow figurines I bought in Japan over a decade ago. One white, one black. At the time, I didn’t think much about them beyond “these look nice.” But finding them again made me curious. Why cows? Why these two? So I started digging. The white one, I now know, came from Dazaifu Tenmangu—a shrine in Fukuoka I’d visited on that trip. It’s a sacred place, famous for its ox statues scattered throughout the grounds. The legend says an ox stopped pulling a funeral cart…
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Hara Hachi Bu: The 80% Rule from Japan’s Longevity Islands
I was reading about Okinawa the other day—those islands south of mainland Japan where people routinely live past 100—and kept seeing the same phrase pop up. “Hara hachi bu.” Stomach eight parts full. Eat until you’re 80% full, then stop. It’s not about leaving food behind or wasting anything. Japanese culture values “mottainai” too deeply for that. Hara Hachi Bu is about knowing when to stop before you hit that stuffed, sluggish feeling. You serve appropriate portions, eat slowly and mindfully, and recognize the moment when you’re satisfied but not heavy. The brain takes 20 minutes to register fullness, so stopping at 80% means you end up perfectly content—not hungry,…
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Washoku: Why Japan’s Young Generation is Rediscovering Traditional Food
I was browsing a Japanese cookbook in a bookstore last week, admiring the beautiful photography, when something struck me. These intricate dishes—following the “one soup, three sides” structure, presented on seasonal tableware—felt completely foreign to me. Not in a bad way, but in a way that made me realize how little I knew about a cuisine I’d only experienced in restaurants. In 2013, UNESCO recognized Washoku—Japan’s traditional dietary culture—as an Intangible Cultural Heritage. It emphasizes fresh, seasonal ingredients at their peak (shun), nutritional balance, and artistic presentation. The “Wa” in Washoku means harmony—promoting bonds among family and community through shared meals. But here’s the paradox: while the world celebrates Washoku,…
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The New Traditionalists
I was watching a documentary the other night about modern Japan, and something caught my attention. A young woman in her early twenties was carefully wrapping a gift. Not with the usual tape and scissors, but with a square of fabric, folding it with these precise, deliberate movements I’d only ever seen my grandmother do. I didn’t think much of it until I started noticing it everywhere. A barista with a small bonsai tree on the counter, talking to it like a pet. A shopkeeper wearing a kimono jacket over jeans, the kind of casual mixing that would have seemed disrespectful a generation ago. A group of teenagers in a…
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A Tiny Cherry Blossom from Japan
Earlier this year, I made my usual pilgrimage to Japan — this time exploring the Osaka–Kansai region and Hiroshima. I try to make the trip every couple of years, and as always, I came home with a few treasures. One of them was a Nanoblock Mininano kit I picked up at a sightseeing spot in Osaka (though I can’t quite remember exactly where). Among the shelves of small souvenirs, this little kit caught my eye. At around ¥990, it felt like the perfect impulse buy. Originally, I’d planned to give it to someone as a gift, but life got in the way. Fast‑forward almost eight months, and I finally found…
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A Bowl of Tea and Rice That Changed My Morning in Kumamoto
It was the summer of 1997, my first time in Japan. My father had arranged for me to stay with his friend in Kumamoto — a doctor who ran a small hospital. His family made me feel welcome right from the start. One morning, I wandered into the kitchen and saw a bowl of leftover rice from the night before, a pot of green tea, and these small paper packets on the table — the kind you get at the supermarket. The doctor’s wife tore one open, sprinkling its mix of dried seaweed, tiny rice crackers, and powdered seasoning over the rice. She poured in the tea and passed the…
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Anime Fans! Initial D Sequal – MF Ghost
As a motor head, during my younger years, my favorite anime apart from Gundam was Initial D. It was the anime that drove me much closer to Japanese culture than when I was in my teens. Apart from all the engine roar & the heart pounding race scenes, Initial D showed a lot of Japanese culture through the daily lives of ordinary people that are sometimes extraordinary. There were scenes of joy, scenes of laughter and scenes of tears that reflects how people are in Japan. Roughly a decade has passed since the end of the Initial D anime and a new car related anime named MF Ghost was released.…
Exploring Japanese Culture
